weekend of racing

congrats to brothers chris and adam for throwing doing their thing at the dam to dam. my knees cry a little just thinking about running that far.

dirty kanza went down this weekend as cornbread, steve, g-t and about 80 others attempted to battle heat and high winds leaving only 15 at the end. congrats to those who made it through as well as anyone willing to line up.

larsson did his thing racing around the base of afton alps.

i made my way up to the cities full well knowing i was about to get my ass kicked. afton as a race course has always beat me down and the pro/expert field did its number on me this year as well. i'm certainly learning to swallow my ego racing with these guys. afton has a murderous amount of climbing and i'm having to deal with the fact that my body is unfortunately fragile in the heat. first lap started out fast and i was riding somewhere in the top half of the field as i was able to climb the entire course. lap 2 of 4 brought that familiar feeling in my stomach and the mild dizzyness. a conscious decision was made to back off for fear of not finishing. started trying to get in fluids despite a stomach that wasn't terribly receptive. had to walk shady lane (1st of 2 big climbs each lap) and got some gu down. was able to continue muscling it around hairpins despite stubbornly not gearing down for this race. made it to manhandler and was quickly walking there as well. a whole line of geared guys passed me here...so it was. i was starting to feel a little better until the super stuttery downhill at the end ejected my full water bottle rather than my empty one. no more carborocket for me. stopped at the water station to refill my empty bottle and did lap 3 on cruise control. still only had to walk shady lane and manhandler and slowly the bottle started to recover. pretty happy i was able to read my body enough to know when to go into damage control mode and come out of it enough to feel like i was pushing a little harder again on lap 4. passed a few riders beat down by the heat and the course but still ended up in the slower half of the field. still learning. still somewhat accepting of where i fit into this field as of right now. far from complacent. don't know what my potential is but i'm far too competitive to accept mid-pack until i'm damn sure that's all the better i'll ever be. if so...its better than i ever thought i'd be. for now, its just another reason to keep busting my ass. oh, and the debilitating forearm cramps that left me unable to use my hands for almost 10 minutes following the race has left me certain that a suspension fork is well past due. physically i'm pretty trashed from this race but the next month should help with both my recovery and my fitness.

love the one-footed corner here...we were flying

larsson with a front row seat...my forearm cramps are excruciating

cheezin post-race